


found families

by bowlingfornerds



Series: Zombieland [5]
Category: z nation
Genre: Canon Universe, Fluff, Found Family, about season 2, its just really cute ok, like a flash back episode
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-11
Updated: 2016-10-11
Packaged: 2018-08-21 21:28:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8260999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bowlingfornerds/pseuds/bowlingfornerds
Summary: A prompt on tumblr: " the group each tells the story of their most impressive Z kill. They may or may not start exaggerating."





	

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so you know those flash back episodes that shows have when they don’t have enough money to make all original content in a season, and they just talk about everything that’s happened so far? Yeah, that’s what writing this felt like.
> 
> The latest episode got me thinking about their oral hygiene too.

They make shelter inside an old gas station, pushing the empty shelves to the wall and settling in on the floor, where a fire flickers inside a metal bucket. Shadows are cast across the walls, an orange glow resting on the group’s weary features. The harshness of the daylight is gone, and their cuts don’t seem so bad, just grazes, in the firelight.

“Alright,” Warren says as she takes a seat in the circle around the fire; the last one to find a place on the ground. “How much food do we have?”

Addy swings her backpack around into her lap and digs through it, searching through the matches, torches and extra clips for her gun.

“Not much,” she replies. “I’ve got four protein bars. Anyone else?” The rest of the room is silent, looking around at each other. Vasquez sits, leaned back with his feet crossed in front of him, staring at the fire in the centre of the room, and next to him, 10k is sat almost the same, but with his legs crossed and a small throwing knife he picked up, balancing on his knee.

Doc sits next to him, rifling through his bag, and setting out bag after bag of fine white powders, small pills and something that looks dried, like dead grass. He shakes his head after a beat.

“Nothing,” he says. “I _had_ a pack of gum, but I think Murphy stole that a few days ago.” On the other side of Doc, Murphy shrugs.

“My breath smelt.”

“It’s the apocalypse,” Addy deadpans. “All of our breath smells. We collectively share a single toothbrush and a tub of bicarb soda.” The group sends Murphy a pointed look, who frowns in response.

“You share a toothbrush?” he asks. “Why don’t you share it with me?”

“You’ve got the zombie thing going on,” Doc replies with a shrug. “Don’t want to catch it just yet.”

“Besides,” Warren continues. “None of us _want_ to share a toothbrush with you.” Vasquez snorts as 10k suppresses a smile, and Addy lines the four cereal bars out in front of her.

“Four bars and seven of us,” she announces. “How do we decide who eats?”

“Does Cassandra count?” Vasquez asks, raising an eyebrow and tilting his head towards the girl, crouching at Murphy’s side and now growling.

“She still _eats_ ,” Murphy retorts.

“Yeah, the flesh of others.” Vasquez looks back to Warren, who sighs.

“Cassandra still eats,” she tells him. “She still needs to have food.”

“Well so you do, Chief,” Doc points out. “You’re leading us – you need some food, too!”

“If we’re going by that logic,” Warren replies across the fire, “you need food because you’re our doctor, 10k needs food because he’s our best shot-“

“Murphy needs food because he’s the saviour of humanity,” Murphy cuts in pointedly. “I’m priority number one, remember.” Addy huffs, rolling her eyes.

“You ate yesterday,” she tells him. “Some of us didn’t.”

“Well I’m the one who has to keep his strength up.”

“We’re the ones _protecting your ass_ ,” Warren retorts, straightening. “We need the food just as much as you, so keep your trap shut or you’re not getting anything.” Murphy glowers but stops speaking, and the others look to each other.

“How do we decide?” Addy asks again. There’s another silence, before 10k breaks it.

“We could compete for it,” he says.

“Compete? It’s dark outside, we’re not going running or fighting right now,” Addy replies. 10k shakes his head, straightening and taking his knife from his knee, before twirling it between two fingers.

“I meant, we could each say our best zombie kill, and the best kills each gets food.” There’s quiet, and then a scoff from Murphy.

“He’s just saying that because he has the most kills to choose from!” Murphy complains, but the others shrug.

“I like that idea,” Warren says. Vasquez nods.

“Me too, I’ve done some pretty good kills if you ask me.”

“Yeah, good idea, kid,” Doc smiles, placing a hand on 10k’s shoulder for a second.

The group agrees to the idea, and for a moment, they all sit in silence as they try to think of their best kill.

“Oh!” Doc announces. “I know! This was way back in the first year, but I remember gettin’ trapped on the lake by a bunch of swimmin’ Zs! We were in the motorboat, trying to have a nice day, like the world weren’t endin’, and this Z tried to climb up out of the water!” Doc grins around the group as he tells his story, the fire flickering between them and casting a glow across his smile. “So I yanked on the cord, the motor starts goin’, and the Z gets trapped inside the turbine! Bit by bit it just starts spinnin’ around the blades, until the entire body is just—floppin’ about in a pinwheel!”

The group laughs at the story, and Doc grins proudly to himself, sitting up a little straighter.

“Okay, okay,” Warren laughs. “What about the time I single-handedly pushed a piano down the stairs of a four storey walk up, and it crushed every single Z on its way down?” Doc rolls his eyes dramatically.

“Well, yeah! That was cool! But where was the presentation?!”

“I think it was at the bottom when Addy tried to perform Mozart on the busted piano!” Warren laughs. Addy breaks out into laughter with her, shaking her head.

“I can’t play for jack, but by God, I tried.”

Next, Vasquez talks about the time he shot four Zs with a single bullet.

“They were all lined up in one, and the shot took down every single one,” he says, and 10k stares at him openly.

“That’s so cool,” he admits.

“Let’s not let 10k get started on his kills,” Addy butts in.

“Yeah, the time he killed four Zs with one bullet – it was three in a row and then the bullet _bounced off_ my necklace to go through the fourth’s brains!” Doc tells them. Vasquez looks at 10k properly for a second, with a furrowed brow, looking for confirmation.

“Seriously?” he asks. 10k nods.

“That was a good day.”

“We got stuck in a hotel with a motivational speaker, and you were tried for murder,” Addy says plainly. 10k shrugs.

“Four zombies with one bullet. Good day.”

“Alright, alright,” Murphy says. “What about all the Zs that Cassandra has managed to kill by literally ripping off their heads?” There’s silence for a second, and then 10k shrugs.

“No, yeah, that’s pretty cool to watch,” he agrees. “Though you’ve never killed a Z.”

“I’ve totally killed a Z!” Murphy retorts. “Like, all the Zs! I’ve killed so many that I’m probably gonna hit ten thousand before you do!” 10k raises a single eyebrow as Murphy glares. “Do you not remember the time I shot one in the head?” Addy snorts.

“We’ve all shot a Z in the head,” she says. “If we hadn’t, we wouldn’t be alive right now.”

“Yeah, b-but,” Murphy continues, exasperated. “It was dark. I couldn’t see.” For a beat, the group sat in silence, then Addy:

“Remember that time I killed a Z by whisking its face with an electric mixer?” She grins widely as the group laughs.

“I inflated a Z with a fire extinguisher until it exploded another time,” 10k adds.

“The Grand Canyon,” Doc calls out, and the group’s laughter probably attracts all the zombies in the town. They don’t care, sitting in their little glowing room, with blankets they’ve been carrying in the bottom of their bags for months, and the gas station’s old bottles of drink still unopened, even if they’ve lost their fizz.

Vasquez looks around the group, bewildered and wide-eyed.

“What have you guys been _doing_?” he questions, and they start laughing once more, unable to hold it in. Addy swipes tears from the corners of her eyes and 10k pulls his knees up to his chest, resting his chin on them and grinning wider than any of them have ever seen before.

They keep sharing stories, the competition slipping their mind as they reminisce over the years of the zombie apocalypse. The stories grow wilder; Addy killing the same zombie over and over in her dreams, and then doing it in real life, then telling the story of how Mack used his hockey boots to slice open a Z’s head (she takes credit for it because he was her boyfriend). Then there’s Doc and the time he apparently blew up an entire shopping mall – although the details to how are sketchy, and he has no witnesses – and Vasquez and the zoo he visited after the apocalypse began, and having to kill the zombie animals.

Addy had chained people together and shot the first, watching the others getting eaten by their friend, when she was in the all-women community. Warren claims to have driven an ambulance off a cliff, jumping out just before it went over, with the back full of zombies. Murphy and Cassandra stay quiet, smiling despite themselves, and feeling a little thankful (though neither of them would/could admit it) that they were travelling with this group, instead of mindless soldiers.

The group goes silent as 10k speaks for the most he ever has in his entire life, describing a time between piking his father and joining the group. He explains the journey through the wilderness, sitting up in a tree and taking out Z after Z, dropping wasp hives on their heads to see what would happen, finding houses with electricity and experimenting with pouring boiling hot water on zombies’ heads to see if it would kill them.

The group stares at him in equal parts horror and awe as he tells them about the time he accidentally brought a building down.

“I was just trying to see if I could make the boiler explode and take the Zs with it,” he shrugs, looking at his friends. “I didn’t realise it would destroy the entire apartment building.”

There’s a length of silence, before Vasquez quietly asks, “how many floors?”

“Nine,” 10k replies. Vasquez swears under his breath as everyone else breaks out into grins.

-

“So, who wins the food?” Doc says at last, after a long time of joking and laughing, telling stories that _couldn’t_ be true (but probably were). The group looks about each other, as Addy shrugs.

“I forgot it was a competition,” she admits. “But, I think 10k wins one, obviously.” Murphy rolls his eyes.

“Shocker,” he deadpans, as Addy throws the cereal bar across the fire. 10k catches it with a smile.

“Vasquez _did_ take out an entire hoard with just three bullets and determination,” Doc relents, and Addy agrees, giving him a bar. The group is silent for a moment, looking at the two remaining bars – the only food they’re going to have left until they find some more. It could be days until they eat again, and the mood feels less familial and more tense. The fire is less of a warm glow, and more like an insistent blaze, wanting its answer.

“I think Addy deserves one,” Warren smiles, “for the mixer to the face and just owning a zombie bear.”

Vasquez frowns.

“You _owned_ a zombie bear?”

“Co-owned,” Addy smiles, picking up a cereal bar for herself. The group is silent again, four people waiting to receive a single cereal bar. Everyone sits, quiet and edgy, waiting for a verdict no one wants to give.

Then, Warren leans forward and picks up the bar. She hesitates for just a second, before throwing it over the fire, into Murphy’s hands.

“Share it with Cassandra,” she says. “She’s pretty badass and you need your strength.” Murphy suppresses his smile, ducking his head and ripping open the cereal bar without a moment to lose. The others don’t move, however, looking between Doc and Warren. They’re both about to open their mouths, to say that _it’s okay, go ahead and eat,_ when 10k speaks.

He holds out his cereal bar to Doc. “Want to share?” he asks, and Doc’s surprise forms a smile.

Addy and Vasquez both glance at each other for only a second, before holding out their cereal bars to Warren.

“There’s plenty to go around,” Addy says. There isn’t, not really, but they’re a family, and they make it work.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I hope you liked it, so if you did please click the kudos button and leave a little comment below! Thanks!


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